safety security
A Smaller Model Saw the Hallucination First
Cross-model hidden-state probes matched or beat generators at locating the onset of semantic drift.
Summary
Cross-model hidden-state probes matched or beat generators at locating the onset of semantic drift.
Rather than label each output token independently, the study probes internal activations to locate the onset and continuation span of a hallucination. The authors report substantial precision-recall AUC improvements over random baselines despite extreme class imbalance. Their cross-model setup lets one model inspect hidden representations elicited by another model's generation; an external observer matched or exceeded the generator's own onset detection, even when the observer was smaller. The result is a preprint evaluation of the tested model pairs and probes, not evidence that smaller models generally know truth better or that access to internal states is available across ordinary hosted systems.
Why it matters
Cross-model hidden-state probes matched or beat generators at locating the onset of semantic drift.
Limits and context
- The result is a preprint evaluation of the tested model pairs and probes, not evidence that smaller models generally know truth better or that access to internal states is available across ordinary hosted systems.
Key claims
Cross-model hidden-state probes matched or beat generators at locating the onset of semantic drift.
Qualification: The result is a preprint evaluation of the tested model pairs and probes, not evidence that smaller models generally know truth better or that access to internal states is available across ordinary hosted systems.
Evidence: source-2026-10-02-002
Sources
- arXiv preprint 2610.02066arXiv · primary research
Corrections
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